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Brooke Canciaris
won't cross. Queen Brooke is one of them. Art by Stuffman.]] "What they did to Miranda - and to me - was monstrous. Irony, of course, being that they created their own monster." - Queen Brooke Canciaris **Full name--** Brooke Canciaris **Race--** Half-Fiendish Human (Canciaris Lineage) **Age--** 39 (Appears to be in early 30s) **Eyes--** Green **Hair--** Blonde **Height--** 6' 0" (Not counting wings) **Weight--** 191 Lbs. **Innate Element--** Dark/Fire **Preferred weapon(s)--** Unknown The political and military leader of the Kingdom of Miranda, Queen Brooke is the fifteenth ruler in her lineage. A stately woman with a proud, regal bearing, Brooke has been through far more than even her age and apparent experience would suggest. She has seen her kingdom fall - only to take it through its rise once more. At home as much on the front lines as she is on the floor of a council-meeting, Brooke's breadth of experience and general predisposition towards patience have made her a respected and admired ruler by her people. She does, however, have a legendary ability to hold a grudge, and has an equally well-known propensity for terrifying those that displease her. Many find Brooke as intimidating as she is enthralling, and though she's an extremely skilled diplomat and competent leader, her ruthless nature, paired with her towering stature and fiendish traits, scare as many people as they inspire. As a leader, Brooke has an admittedly-justified paranoid streak, especially given her history. She is rarely seen outside of the Palace except when her presence is absolutely required, though she does occasionally attend formal or charity events. She is not, however, a coward. Rather, she is cautious and sophisticated - she knows the game of politics extremely well, and she is one of the best players. It is only on the rare occasion someone legitimately gets the better of her that her vengeful streak shows. Brooke is believed to have a body double, but this has never been actually confirmed or denied as far as most of the group is concerned. As a member of the Canciaris Lineage, Brooke possesses phenomenal magic power; her mother was widely regarded as one of the most powerful mages to ever live. Brooke herself rarely flaunts her magical abilities, usually using them only when teaching at the Mirandian Mage Academy. As a half-fiend, Brooke possesses large, membranous wings. Brooke is not a terribly graceful or agile flyer, but is quite skilled at using her wings to protect herself or move quickly as needed. Brooke has a friendly, if somewhat adversarial, relationship with Chameleon and Valkyrie. She is quite close to her cousin Elhena, and is extremely close to Voryn. She dislikes Jaimas and absolutely despises Aurelis, and has a generally oppositional viewpoint in regards to the dragon council in general. Her relationship with her children is somewhat more complex; while a loving mother, Brooke simply does not have as much time to spend on her children as she would like; this has resulted in a small bit of alienation between Brooke and her eldest daughter, Ivianna. ---- History: Ekris War Era A half-fiend born to Queen Victoria, Brooke never had a chance for an easy life. In an attempt to conceal Brooke's nature and to give her daughter a better chance for a "normal" life, Victoria placed a powerful magic seal on Brooke that concealed her fiendish characteristics. The seal was intended so that Victoria could tell Brooke of her true nature when she was old enough. Unfortunately, Victoria never got that chance... Queen Brooke was born before the Ekris War's start, but predominantly grew up during the war itself. The facets of life under occupation from first the Hevarazians, then from Valendia and Paramis, left an indelible imprint on the girl as she grew up; she respected and admired the Hevarazians who helped defend Miranda, and despised the Valendians and Paramisians that had drove them out. That Miranda had become occupied due to weakness likewise left quite an impression; Brooke learned very early on that it was due to Miranda's relative peace and prosperity that it allowed its military to have weakened to the degree it had. Throughout the occupation, Victoria Canciaris, Queen Brooke's mother, went about training her daughter in the arts of magic, as well as grooming her towards taking the throne herself when she was old enough. While Victoria herself was functionally Queen in name only by this point, she had been organizing forces in secret and quietly arming resistance and insurgent groups against the Valendians and Paramisians. When this was discovered, the Miranda Disaster occured - an event which left deeper marks on Queen Brooke than perhaps anything else. The Miranda Disaster saw Brooke lose her mother, sister, and virtually everything she had known and loved in a single night. Brooke herself survived, but with her kingdom's capital destroyed, Miranda's limited military in tatters, and the bulk of her country under occupation from hostile forces, Brooke saw only one recourse: revenge - and she went about seeking it immediately. As Princess Brooke, by all accounts, was dead - another casualty of a disaster that had claimed over 50000 lives already - Brooke came upon a rather long-winded plan of retribution: she would, through a fake ID and no small amount of training, infiltrate Valendia's military, and get close enough to its leadership to inflict the same kind of disaster upon the Valendians that they had visited on Miranda. She trained herself for over a year to hone her assumed identity and mannerisms to perfection, and upon reaching Valendia, found that her ability to use magic and natural skill at leadership got her far in the heirarchy. She quickly found herself under the tutelage of Colonel Varne, the head of Valendia's Penal Units - military units that were comprised of scum otherwise bound for the firing squad - who impressed upon Brooke his own special brand of leadership. Whilst Brooke was initially reviled by this, she swallowed her pride and played the part of his assistant, all the while longing for the day when she could pay down a debt owed to Valendia in blood. As Brooke served in the 473rd, she increasingly found herself questioning her motives and the justness of her actions. Whilst she pushed the overpowering majority of these questions aside, she suffered from continual nightmares and grew increasingly paranoid as she ascended the ranks of Valendia's military. The closer she pushed herself towards her goal, the more she found herself turning into something she hated; more and more she found herself having to choose between doing something morally reprehensible to her or moving closer to what she ultimately sought. This brought Brooke to a horrid realization: that in doing what she did, she would be becoming, to someone else, what Valendia was to her: a monster that had taken everything from her and then more. In the end, Brooke put aside her mission for revenge, after she wound up saving a girl named Lisa, who she would form a close friendship with - the first actual friend she had in almost a decade. She then defected from Valendia, fleeing with a fair amount of her own forces, her newfound ally, and a stolen airship that had just left the prototype phase. The entire group retreated to Mirandian territory, where they formed a mercenary unit operating out of the shattered capital. Post-Ekris War and the Falstine Incident After the Ekris War, Brooke, her stolen ship, her best friend, Lisa, and the soldiers under her command that remained loyal went mercenary. Brooke's unit was neither terribly large nor successful, but the unit garnered enough attention to keep unprepared forces out of the area of the now-devastated Mirandian capital. The unit was later approached by a political officer from a country named Maletta, who was willing to pay Brooke and her unit a hefty sum to sieze and hold a Valendian research facility known as Point Falstine whilst troops from Maletta conducted an infiltration and espionage mission, seeking copies of the research data. Given her hatred for Valendia, Brooke needed precious little convincing. The mission, later, turned out to be a setup; Maletta backstabbed her unit, and Brooke's soldiers were largely wiped out, with her airship stolen. Lisa herself gave her life to ensure Brooke could escape the facility, but ultimately was unsuccessful; Brooke wound up captured by Malettan troops and was dragged off in chains. Interestingly, Brooke's unit and the Malettans were not the only one at the facility. Jaimas, who had left Valendia to work for Daramir's Internal Ministry, had been part of a team that was also investigating the facility, as Hevaraz suspected Paramis was conducting illicit weapons research and wanted proof. In his observations, Jaimas unwittingly stumbled upon an international incident in progress; Maletta was far from Fontraile, and the facility, while in Paramisian territory, was being run by Valendia. Bringing this up, Jaimas wound up being assigned to track down the missing pieces; this was a major scandal against one of Daramir's enemies, and some political clout that could seriously muck things up for both Valendia and Maletta. Jaimas' assignment wound up taking him from Fontraile to Eulitracia and then back to Velgarde. In truth, Brooke had been what Maletta was after all along - the facility itself was only a minor base designed to lure her to it with a convincing story. In actuality, Maletta, with Valendia's help, had been researching the Canciaris lineage for its magical prowess and was researching an artificial way to provide its rank-and-file troops with advanced spellcasting prowess. The Miranda Disaster had occured, at least partially, to ensure that members of the Canciaris lineage were acquired - either dead or alive - for research. Brooke's deceased mother had given them a wealth of valuable information, and with a live specimen - Brooke herself - Maletta had hoped that they could finish and perfect the process. Finding out the truth, Brooke was enraged; the emotional shock of finding out the cause of the war was so intense that it caused the seal to break and Brooke's fiendish traits to emerge - she nearly escaped containment before being tranquilized again. Having put together the pieces of the puzzle, Jaimas, aided by allies he had met in his investigation from all over the globe - Funkytown, Avonell, Valendia, Hevaraz, Westerly, Sigilus, Augustgrad, and Renalia - set about storming Maletta outright to secure the final bits of evidence of Maletta's involvement in the Miranda disaster - and they found it in spades. Extensive documentation connecting Valendia to Maletta and to the research performed at the facilty was found, and Brooke herself was a key piece of evidence as well. With the final pieces put together, the group went before the League of Nations and Daramir put forth the evidence that had been collected, as well as witness testimony. Desperate to mitigate the damage from this by any means necessary, Valendia tried everything from an assassination attempt to bribes in order to quell the investigation. Jaimas himself proved to have a price and quietly went away as far as problems went, but it did little to put away the mountain of evidence that had been collected. Ultimately, the League of Nations indicted Valendia on numerous counts and imposed dozens of sanctions, both economic and otherwise. Miranda was given back to its rightful ruler - Brooke herself - and Valendia was forbidden from ever again interfering with the region. Brooke dedicated herself towards seeing her kingdom flourish once more, and for the first time in nearly 2 decades, Miranda began to rebuild itself. Key to this was a man she had fallen in love with before and during the trial - Hevaraz's current ruler, Jacob Lavitz. The two were married later that year. The Reconstruction Miranda's reconstruction took time - years - and was made possible only by a combination of factors. Valendia's economic sanctions provided Miranda with a token level of money with which to get started, but it was capital and industrial muscle from Hevaraz that was a major factor in helping get Miranda rebuilt. Neo Arcadia, through the Ultra Crew Institute, also was a major factor, helping Miranda construct schools and hospitals and providing routine cash infusions in return for Miranda providing Neo Arcadia with a major trade partner on Fontraile. As Miranda grew larger - and stronger - it began to form a more secure and permanent set of alliances with its neighbors. Queen Brooke's choice of husband had been a major contributing factor towards the above, and it was during the reconstruction that Brooke herself had three children: Fraternal twins, Ivianna and James, and a second daughter later, Illyra. It was at this point, now that Miranda was once again getting back on its feet, that Brooke began to learn that she had more family left than she had initially anticipated. Her younger sister, Vanessa, had survived, and was living in Hevaraz. Her cousin, Elhena, was alive, and was living in the territory now known as Raxis. For the first time in ages, Brooke felt at peace - while the time was very tense, and there was constant worries regarding whether Miranda itself would remain stable in these formative years with Brooke as Queen, it was the first time in years that she had legitimately looked forward to each day. Ultimately, Miranda would grow and thrive under Brooke's leadership, becoming larger than it had been prior to any time in the nation's history, save for the bloody reign of her ancestor Queen Veronica, some 300 years previous. Having learned from her mother, and from what she had seen and experienced, Brooke ensured Miranda's military remained strong even throughout the relative prosperity the country had shown post-reconstruction; never again would Miranda suffer the fate it did during the Ekris War. Unfortunately, all was not well; her husband, suffering from a respitory infection, died soonafter James and Ivy's 7th birthday. His passing affected Brooke quite deeply, and Brooke redoubled her dedication towards her country - albeit at the cost of all else. While Brooke has attempted to remain a caring and engaged parent, there remains a distance between her and her children, which is especially pronounced in her relationship with her eldest daughter, Ivy, who was particularly close to her father. Being a full-time ruler has left Brooke far less time than she would like to spend on her family, though she sees this as a necessary evil and does not seek to flee her duty. The Paramisian War Paramis' declaration of war came with neither warning nor fanfare; soonafter a series of what appeared to be terrorist attacks, Paramis, apparently having been seized by an extremist wing within the Paramisian government, invaded Miranda with overpowering force, quickly overwhelming the country and nearly pushing in as far as the capital before Miranda, rallying with its allies, pushed Paramis back and over several months, fought it back to its borders. Unfortunately, the war is far from over. Brooke has had to face, due to new evidence, the fact that Paramis had a commanding role in not only Valendia's occupation of Miranda in the first place, but in the Miranda Disaster itself as well. Not particularly liking the implications of this one bit, Brooke has been considerably more cautious since the war's onset; Miranda cannot truly know peace until the Paramisians are defeated, or so Brooke believed. With the end of the War, the queen has backed off from such talk - but it's very clear her distrust and dislike of the Paramisian Empire remains. Gallery File:Roadgggcommish (1).jpg|Her groove; do not fuck with it. Art by Cr0.